FTSE Shares That Soared and Plunged This Week

A look back at the week in London.

LONDON -- The FTSE 100(FTSEINDICES:^FTSE) finished the week above 6,300 for only the second time this year, ending Friday at 6,328 points. The market was torn between improving U.K., American, and Asian sentiment on one hand, and on the other, eurozone fears after news that the German and French economies shrank in the final quarter of 2012, by 0.6% and 0.3%, respectively. Here are four FTSE 100 stocks that moved significantly during the week.

Barclays(LSE:BARC)The price of Barclays, the High Street bank that avoided the need for a government bailout, has seen its stock price flying. And last week, that price gained 22.7 pence (7.6%) to 321 pence. Tuesday was the big day, when the company announced a 26% rise in underlying pre-tax profit (most of which was wiped out by charges for various mis-selling problems and other exceptional items, but that was expected) and lifted its full-year dividend by 8% to 6.5 pence per share.

Aberdeen Asset Management(LSE:ADN)Investment manager Aberdeen Asset Management has had a great week, with its price climbing 24 pence (6%) to 428 pence after the company revealed its latest acquisition of Artio Global Investors for an all-cash price of $175 million. The stock is now up more than 60% over the past 12 months, as the firm's total assets under management have risen to 193 million pounds by December, from September's figure of 187 billion pounds.

Reckitt Benckiser(LSE:RB)Reckitt Benckiser enjoyed a 243 pence (5.7%) stock-price boost to 4,478 pence this week. On Wednesday, the consumer-products giant told us that full-year revenues were up 4% to 9.6 billion pounds (at constant exchange rates) with like-for-like sales up 5%, and announced a 7% boost to its dividend to 134 pence per share. The company has also agreed to a three-year deal with Bristol-Myers Squibb for the sale of a range of health-care products in Latin America. For steady year-on-year rises in dividend payouts, Reckitt Benckiser is one of the most reliable in the FTSE.

AMEC(LSE:AMEC)The biggest FTSE 100 fall in the week came from AMEC, even as the engineering consultancy and project manager raised its dividend by 20%. Investors dumped the stock, and it fell 75 pence (6.8%) to 1,026 pence. The company announced a 28% rise in revenue to 4.16 billion pounds, with underlying revenue up 21%, though after excluding 320 million pounds of incremental procurement, that figure dropped to a rise of 12%. Overall, the results were in line with expectations, but the market was clearly hoping for better.

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